The Offa robbery of 2018 and the irresponsible way Nigeria has handled the aftermath is one more good reason why those running their mouths against former President Olusegun Obasanjo and the Nobel Laureate, Professor Wole Soyinka [for warning the Federal Government] that Nigeria is tottering towards state failure, should shut their traps.
One of the key symptoms of a failed state is cutting deals with criminals instead of punishing them.
The Offa robbery was a bloody one during which the criminal gang killed 17 policemen and civilians. One of the ringleaders of the operation has a politically exposed father who launched a vicious attack against me on behalf of a leading figure in the ruling party at a time he should bury his head in shame. I knew he wanted to use me to ingratiate himself to the power wielders in the country so as to get a soft landing for his robber-son. I refused to swallow his bait. I just dismissed him that the father of an armed robber who was desperate to get his son off justice cannot produce holy witness.
I specifically mentioned that as against his criminal claim that he approached former Lagos State governor, Senator Bola Tinubu, to assist when I was sick in 1999. He was somebody I had access to and would have reached directly if I was comfortable asking people for money. It was our lovely leader and father, Senator Abraham Adesanya, who called him and asked my wife to go and see him, not an unfeeling and uncaring man who was taking credit for all I was doing even under illnesss. My wife said Tinubu, in fairness to him, abandoned his food and lamented “how can Yinka be going through this without letting me know.” He called the [Lagos State] heath commissioner to arrange what I needed for a medical trip.
May the soul of Pa Adesanya rest in peace. Professor Akin Onigbinde tells the story of how he physically led him and his wife to see a doctor when his wife was ill. There was a colleague of ours whose wife he observed was waiting on God for a child; he wrote some herbs for him to buy from a shop in London. The woman became pregnant in a month. Good old man!
I saw you in your dirtiest with money that I couldn’t ask you for a penny even as I saw you rolling in sudden unearned dough. You were like king of Edom to me of whom Abraham said “I willl not take a hoof, lest he says I made Abraham. I recall how you were camping two daughters of your late friend with bait of sacks of money. And you thought such would never have consequence(s)?
The young man you were trying to use me to cover up his crimes obviously had some inheritance from a dad who allegedly did time in Minna Prison over stolen clothes in a laundry outfit where he worked.
A Senior Advocate of Nigeria (SAN) friend of mine sent me the lies you concocted a few days back which he said was sent to him. I did not ask him the identity of the person as my spirit told me immediately who it was. And like Apostle Paul came back on “Alexander, the coppersmith who did me great harm”. I have to come back for you as five of the Offa robbers were arraigned in court a few days ago and your son was not among them.
It was clear the Nigerian state had fallen for your pranks when Offa robbery became part of the “o to ge” weapons against Senator Bukola Saraki. Instead of going after the criminals, spirited efforts were made to link the crime to the then Senate President who they wanted out at all costs.
Governor Nasir el-Rufai of Kaduna State was in Kwara State in June 2018 to commend the Inspector-General of Police, Mr Ibrahim Idris, on the manner he had been handling the investigation of Offa bank robbery, saying he was doing an excellent job. El-Rufai made the commendation in Oro town at the annual Ramadan lecture organised by the Minister of Information and Culture, Alhaji Lai Mohammed, who is a native of the town. Recall that the National Assembly had just passed a vote of no confidence in the police boss whose action and inactions they considered antithetical to democracy. But El-Rufail praised the police boss on the occasion and thanked the Chief Imam of Oro, Mikhail Onisan, for praying for the nation and leaders. He said: “I thank the Chief Imam for his prayers for the country, President Buhari, Inspector-General of Police, who is doing an excellent job, Minister of Information and others. May God accept his prayers. “Irrespective of what anybody might be saying, he (IGP) deserves commendation, and Almighty Allah will continue to guide him.’’
The Almighty guided him out of office disgracefully as he politicised a high crime instead of dealing with the criminals.
All those who messed up the investigations into the robbery in Offa will answer questions before God some day, as the lives lost were His precious creations.
The one who lied against me to curry favour from men would not have such a privilege before God. The blood of the innocent will cry loudly.
State failure
Typically, the term means that the state has been rendered ineffective and is not able to enforce its laws uniformly or provide basic goods and services to its citizens because of (variously) high crime rates, insurgency, extreme political corruption, an impenetrable and ineffective bureaucracy, judiciary.
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